Mozilla blocks Skype toolbar causing 40,000 Firefox crashes

The Mozilla team has decided to block the Skype Toolbar due to serious stability and performance issues. Up to and including the current shipping and beta versions of the Skype Toolbar will be added to the Mozilla Firefox Blocklist for all versions of Firefox sometime in the next 48 hours. Since this is a "soft block," users will be prompted and given the option to re-enable it if they wish.

I see plenty of machines with various toolbars installed in the browsers. Most applications don't make it clear they're installing something or people don't pay attention. The average user just clicks through the installer without reading anything.

JMMD said:
I see plenty of machines with various toolbars installed in the browsers. Most applications don't make it clear they're installing something or people don't pay attention. The average user just clicks through the installer without reading anything.

Click to expand...

Bingo. Anytime my wife installs anything, I have to stand over her shoulder, otherwise she'll click "next" until there are no more "next" buttons to push. My mom is the same way. People just don't pay attention mainly because they aren't expecting it. They think they're just installing the program/app.

JMMD said:
I see plenty of machines with various toolbars installed in the browsers. Most applications don't make it clear they're installing something or people don't pay attention. The average user just clicks through the installer without reading anything.

Click to expand...

Bingo. Anytime my wife installs anything, I have to stand over her shoulder, otherwise she'll click "next" until there are no more "next" buttons to push. My mom is the same way. People just don't pay attention mainly because they aren't expecting it. They think they're just installing the program/app.

Click to expand...

What drives me nuts is when people do that. Then they ask me what I DID to mess up their browser.

Nobody with half a brain willingly installs these third party toolbars. What's worse is when you're trying to fix someones laptop, you open their web browser and half of the screen is just the toolbars they've installed. It makes you want to just give up, throw the laptop in the bin and set the owner on fire, because you know it'll end up in exactly the same state within a week.

"Mozilla blocks Skype toolbar causing 40,000 Firefox crashes" reads like the process of blocking the toolbar CAUSED the crashes. A better one would have been "Mozilla blocks Skype toolbar that caused 40,000 Firefox crashes."